All's Weird that Ends Weird

Sometimes I like to tell stories of things that happen in my life. Sometimes those things flatter me, but more often they are passively embarrassing or overtly humiliating. This is a tale that is both of those latter things.

I was, once upon a time, singing at Ozzie's. Shocking, I know. I was there by myself on a Saturday night, and I was drinking more than a little bit.

I was downstairs, waiting for my turn to sing, when I saw a couple of reasonably attractive young women standing in front of me. One of them had, I noticed, a card on a necklace around her neck. My eyes are pretty good, but I couldn't make out what it said. Because of the combination of the woman being attractive and me drinking more than a little bit, I asked the woman what the card read.

"Have a man speak to you in another language."

Immediately upon reading this, I went into inner turmoil. It was minor turmoil, for sure, but it was turmoil.

As everyone who knows me should know by now, I'm not a big fan of bachelorette parties. More specifically, I REALLY don't like them. I admit that they have their place as a ritual for brides-to-be, and for the brides-to-be's friends, but I also know that much of that ritual is to mockingly flirt with men around them while ignoring objective measures of attractiveness... meaning they usually act much more hot than they are.

(Yes, I know society's standards for beauty in women is, at many levels, bullshit. I know that how a woman is on the inside matters. I know that it's not fair that gorgeous women get away with more in life than more plain ones. But when I'm in a bar drinking, I rarely care much about any of that.)

So, on the one hand, I had my disdain for the bachelorette party generally. On the other hand, I had a great opportunity to talk to a couple of attractive women, and ... I'd been drinking more than a little bit.

The rum won out (as it occasionally does) and I opened. It went something like this:

Me: Puedo hablar español para usted...
Her #1: What?
Her #2: Ah... [insert a BUNCH of Spanish that I didn't follow at all due to ignorance and rum consumption]
Me: Wow. I didn't get any of that.
Her #1: ...
Her #2: ...

There comes a time in every conversation with women I don't know, where I have to power through discomfort or flee (as gracefully as possible).

The conversation with these two women wasn't a disaster to this point, so I continued the chit-chat, asking if either of them were the ones getting married (they weren't) and if they were going to sing (they weren't).

Her #1 clearly wasn't that into me. My ego told me it was because she had a boyfriend, of course. (Whether facts would tell me that or not is another matter. I never found out.)

Her #2, though? She was staring at me the whole time with a big smile on her face. That, for the record, is either a very good sign (she's interested) or a very bad one (she's totally insane). I decided that it was probably the former, so I got their names, told them it was great to meet them, and that I'd see them around the bar later.

And, I did see them around later.

More rum had gone into my system, and I was getting ready to sing upstairs when Her #2 approached me. She had a card around her neck this time, and as the karaoke song was being queued up, she smiled and stared at me and I grabbed the card and it said, "Be serenaded by a man."


I told her it seemed I was the next best thing, and I sang to her.

She seemed to enjoy it, and at the end of the song I noticed that her entire bachelorette troupe was in a booth on the other side of the room. I noticed because they were all chanting, "Kiss her. Kiss her."

I looked at Her #2 and she stopped staring long enough to roll her eyes. We smiled at one another. And I kissed her.

To the applause of her party.

Coincidentally, it was just about closing time. I asked where she lived (she lived close). I asked her if she wanted an escort home (she did). I asked her if she wanted to leave right then (she did).

On our way out of the bar, one of her friends checked in on her, establishing that I wasn't kidnapper Her #2, and that she was sober enough to not be constructively kidnapped. After a brief conversation, we headed to Her #2's place.

Which was fine. I'm going to gloss over things until the way the night/morning ended, but highlights/lowlights included:

• No television (??)
• An awesomely friendly Siamese cat
• A funny txt exchange with one of her friends that she let me write "her" end of

So... after a couple of hours of talking (and stuff) it was about 4AM. I was exhausted and much more sober. And the conversation got weird.

Her #2: ...
Me: What's up?
Her #2: ...
Me: You're acting weird all of a sudden.
Her #2: ...
Me: What's up?
Her #2: ... it's just ...
Me: ...
Her #2: ...
Me: Is it cool if I crash here tonight?
Her #2: ... well, my parents are going to come pick me up tomorrow...
Me: What time?
Her #2: 10:00.
Me: Bah. No problem. I'll get a few hours of sleep and be out of here well before then.
Her #2: ...
Me: What?
Her #2: ... I think I need alone time.
Me: OK. Now?
Her #2: Yeah.
Me: ...
Her #2: ...
Me: Are you just waiting for me to leave at this point?
Her #2: Yeah.
Me: Ouch. OK.

And so, with that, I got dressed (meaning put my shoes and jacket back on, of course), petted the cat, and departed.

It was (and remains) the oddest brush-off I'd ever received from a woman while in her bed, and I lashed out in the only way I knew how: I failed to ask for her telephone number.

That'll show her, right?

Even after all this time, I'm still processing whether this experience makes me dislike bachelorette parties more or less...